Heaven's Door
by Kessie-Louise
Summary: Ray exists in a state both alive and dead. But when her body shuts down in a high class town without any xels around, she finds herself in the home of a young genius who may have a way of fixing her for good. Is it too good to be true, or has Ray found heaven's door? [WIP]
1. Out of Time

**ROBOTIC LICENSE CRITERIA** :

* Is 15 years and six months, as shown on their personal identification (driver's license, passport, etc.)

* Has passed the Advanced Robotics Exam, as provided by their local technical college with an average score of 75% or better

* Does not currently hold any criminal record in robotics or other devious endeavors that may/has endangered fellow humans or robots

* Has proven to be capable of handling/building advanced technologies while under strict guidance/internship of either Cherry Dynamics or SANDA Technologies, or other verified Top 500 robotic companies for a minimum of 160 full hours or more

. . .

Ray had wandered too far away from the Colosseum today, and at the moment she didn't care.

Due to this, there were very little xels around. Perhaps a few robotic mail carriers, or a sentient stop light, but it was nothing that could give a permanent fill. It was at the local park where she was able to find some sense of fullness, but the supply became limited quickly. Ray knew her limits, never doubt it, and she knew how long it would take for her to get to a more bountiful supply of xels- she had more than enough time to make it back to the Colosseum before the desperate cravings could begin. Besides, when was the last time she simply took a walk about the city?

The upper crust developments were closer to the Colosseum, but after the Trinity disaster, they also became robot free zones. Xels were scarce, that didn't mean they were completely eradicated from the area though. Ray found her way into a park- a nice one with plenty of trees and well maintained gym sets for children. There was even a walking trail dotted with light posts, meant to be used to illuminate the path, but Ray saw it as a quick snack.

Eventually, Ray came to a clearing near a walking trail. No one was around, but she could detect a lone soul sitting on a park bench nearby. Coming in a little closer and Ray could see a human girl, not much older than 14 or so, work on something with a holographic laptop, displayed in front of her like a projection. The girl was dressed in a school uniform apparently, with near black hair held tightly at the top of her head and a pink headband keeping away stray pieces that could have gotten into her face. She was mumbling something, causing some sense of curiosity in the robot, so she lingered closer to hear.

"Magnus is requesting tweaks to his magma insulation. For some reason he thinks that he's formulating too slow- what he doesn't realize is that he needs that regulation to prevent overheating and implosion. Won't listen to me, even though he 'trusts my judgment in all matters' or whatever. Yeah right, that suck up… But still, he's a nice bot once you get him back down to earth again. Perhaps I could adjust his inner thermometer to read a bit differently, but would he notice? It would definitely be the safer option for him to think that, though… But what he overexerts the pressure gauge in tandem with the magma regulator…? Hmmm… wouldn't be the first time."

Ray sneered as she decided to pass by the human without being seen. The kid talked too much for someone who looked barely old enough to hold a robotics license. What a joke.

Suddenly, a spike of pain hit Ray like a bullet to the head.

"No!" she audibly cursed, "It isn't time! I… I had…!"

The pain in her side started to get worse, forcing Ray to hold onto it. Desperately, she looked around for xels. But in this area, she knew too well, there wouldn't be any. She wandered too far and now she was going to pay the price.

"Is someone there?" the girl inquired, still sitting on the park bench. Ray sneered- she thought she had gotten far enough away from the brat to be heard, even while in pain, but apparently her desperation acted like a siren to anyone in the vacancy. Limping and the pain growing, Ray stumbled as quickly as she could away from the park. There had to be xels around here somewhere, there had to be.

The girl was following her, Ray could sense her coming closer.

"Wait!" the girl called out, "I can help fix you!"

With all of her systems were shutting down at once from xel depletion, Ray paused for a moment. Desperation told her to do it, to listen to this child whose techno babble was nearly impressive; but common sense told her that she would have been better off dying. Besides, the only one that knew their salt when it came to Ray's body and her schematics was her creator. Right? So why let this brat do the honors?

"You can't fix me." Ray sneered as she started to push forward again. "Go away!"

The girl still trailed behind Ray with persistence. "Please, I really can help fix you!"

"I said-" Ray started to screech, whirling around to point her arm cannon at the human, but the pain was too much and the sudden turn had broken her equilibrium. The robot fell to the ground as her diagnostics began to read an 89% failure shutdown. Not much longer now and she would be as dead as a robot could get.

To Ray's annoyance, the girl had managed to catch up.

"Please," Ray could barely hear the girl request, "I'll fix you. I'll fix you as good as new."

Straining, trying as hard as she could to aim her buster at the girl with little luck, Ray let out one last defiant "No..." before shutting down for good.

. . .

5KY51R3N: Mitch I need help.

NullVoid00: shoot

5KY51R3N: I need parts.

NullVoid00: ? ? ?

5KY51R3N: CherryDyn, circa '97, SP build Omega

5KY51R3N: it's older than Troilus.

NullVoid00: I was gonna say…

NullVoid00: Imma have to check L

NullVoid00: why that late tho? what are you up to?

5KY51R3N: New project. Fresh body. You know how it is.

NullVoid00: but that late? who did you capture now?

5KY51R3N: Can't say yet. Maybe later.

NullVoid00: w cherrydyn tech? no way, tell me why and who

NullVoid00: or tell me ur kidding

NullVoid00: L?

NullVoid00: L tell me ur kidding?!

NullVoid00: L?!

5KY51R3N has signed out


	2. Lambs Eat Flowers

The townhouse's basement looked more like a garage than an underground robot repair facility. Which was great… she thinks, in case anyone ever decided to take her away, but at least she knew where everything was. Unless she didn't know where she put her precision tools, then there was a problem. She just had them too… where on earth could they have gone?

She had taken the liberty to hook the robot up to the computer she used to analyze one's inner workings. This computer was no better or faster than an old Commodore 64, but it still served its uses. So far, she had been able to process some basic information: who made the robot, what her code number was, her nickname, and some other little details. It would take longer for a full diagnostic. Although, even without the full details, there was some sort of anomaly located in… _everywhere_ of that robot. Removing its weapons as a safeguard seemed to have slightly dropped the severity of those anomalies, oddly enough. Removing the rest of the robot's armor could help diagnose what caused the anomaly to begin with, but she needed to find her tools. Oh, for the love of Thomas T. Hikari- where _were_ they?

On the counter, near the door that led back up to the main house, her phone started to buzz- indicating that someone had text her. Annoyed at her lost things, she walked over to the phone to see who needed her.

Richard, 9:19 PM: L? U didn't answer me. I demand answers.

 _And you're still not getting them_ , she defiantly thought to herself before she noticed something to the side of her phone. Her tools had been next to her phone this entire time. Letting out a relieved sigh, she picked up her tools and went back to the robot. It was going to take awhile to peel off the layers, but hopefully the robot could respond soon when its system didn't have to focus energy to twenty different outputs.

. . .

It had been awhile since Ray had gone through a hard reboot. Admittedly, not the best thing in the world, but it gave her time to reassess her bearings. And the biggest elephant in the room?

"You... removed my weapons?" the bot questioned to the head by the side of her right hip, no doubt the girl from earlier. "How...?!"

Surely enough, the head paused and turned itself around to look her in the eye. The human girl had a dollish face, flat chest, and innocent enough expression for someone illegally tampering with a contraption that certainly wasn't hers.

"I self taught myself reverse engineering, and by extension, robotics." the girl told Ray in a still tone, as if testing to see how the bot would respond to such news. "You're the seventh robot I've helped after a serious shut down. You seemed pretty far gone too… I didn't think you'd ever boot back up again. Your coding is one big mess- like a complex spider web, but without the planning."

Giving the human a rather dirty look, Ray decided that she needed to get out now before she found her personality chip inside a toaster. She didn't realize how damaged she was, though, from the reboot, leaving Ray to let out a pained groan as she attempted to sit up.

"Hold still!" the girl quickly proclaimed, immediately slapping her left hand on the robot's torso, just a little below the breast area. "One false move and you could experience severe paralysis and a full's day of work will be down the sink!"

Grumbling, the robot relaxed again so the human girl could continue.

"You're too young to be screwing around with advanced robotics." Ray seethed as she helplessly allowed the teen to make modifications. The girl didn't seem to listen, and instead went deeper into Ray's code. Huffing, and finding she had no other choice, Ray looked up at the ceiling and waited.

"Alright." the girl eventually decided, "You can sit up now. Just not too quickly, your gyroscope still seems to be a bit off."

Compliant, if only to gain some sense of trust while looking for a way out, Ray sat up before dully tracking what the girl was doing. The human placed her tools in a drawer before coming back over to the robot.

"My name is Leilani." the girl greeted, sticking her hand out for Ray to shake. The bot looked at it, then looked at the human girl with disgust.

"You don't need to know who I am." she told the girl darkly. "Just like you didn't need to 'fix' me. I was fine."

Leilani tilted her head to the side, unsure of whether to be confused or amused. "You were going to reactivate yourself when you had less than eleven picowatts running through you?" she mused with a grin. "That's some feat."

Ray didn't answer, she didn't feel obligated to, really.

"Your name is Raychel, right?" the girl then inquired. "It was the nickname listed in your coding, but I wasn't sure if it was the author signature or not."

Ray looked at the human with a blank stare. There was just something about this that didn't seem right. Or maybe it was because an illegal robotist she didn't know still knew how to access her coding.

"Yes." Ray agreed. "That is my name."

Leilani smiled, a nice one, a real award winner.

"I like it." the girl told Ray, as if she needed to be impressed. "You know it means 'gentle lamb.' Mine means 'heavenly flower.' Pretty neat, huh?"

"Lambs eat flowers." Ray mindlessly spat. Leilani looked at her, as if she were trying to analyze the unintended double entendre in Ray's words. Shaking her head, the human girl then left to get something on a nearby table, and brought it back to Ray.

It was a small bowl filled with some kind of solid blue energy, cut into crystal-like shapes. They almost seemed to have the same energy readings of xels- barely. There was a faint difference, but for a bot who wasn't aware of how desperate she was for energy, Ray chose not to comment on it.

"Eat this," Leilani suggested, "It's synthesized energen fragments. It should work with your BIOS well enough. I manufactured it just for you."

This caused a red flag, though.

"That's not possible." Ray told the girl with a dark tone. "No one knows my BIOS, let alone what works with it. How are you able to do that, and under what reason do I have to trust you?"

For the longest time, the human didn't have an answer. Ray stared her down- there had to be a reason, an explanation for the very idea that this child could do something her own creator couldn't. Eventually, Leilani carefully opened her mouth to say, "If that's the only thing you find impossible about this, then you're in for a rude awakening."


	3. Worth Her Salt

"You're not the first robot patented under Cherry Dynamics that I've worked with. Creating the general substance was easy- but for your body to accept them became the hard part. When I removed your weapons, it also effected your power. I was able to take this bit of knowledge to make the energen fragments be accepted by your power core. It's really not that hard when you know what you're doing."

Ray would have never thought she could be able of believing what this child was saying. She knew her salt though, that's for sure.  
"A part of the problem seems to lie in your armor," the girl went on. "I might need to remove it to keep a better idea of what I'm looking for."  
"How about no?" Ray challenged with a grimace. "You were able to turn me back on, big whoop, your job here is done- give me my weapons back and we can be back on our merry way."  
"It's not going to be that simple." Leilani informed the robot with a shrug. "It took nearly a whole day to safely remove them, it will take a whole day to put them back. Regardless, the damage in your system is beyond critical- someone has to help you or you're going to die." The girl paused for a moment before adding, "You'll be more than a brain in a jar. Promise."

"I said no." Ray growled.

"I can help." Leilani calmly persisted, putting a careful hand on the bot's arm. "Just trust me."

Ray was appalled. First of all, this child insists on having Ray trust her when she essentially kidnapped her, then gave the premonition of allowing her to invade Ray's personal coding to make illegal changes. Secondly, she touched her. This child -this 14 year old child who is illegally aiding robots without a robotics license- _touched_ Ray without permission as an attempt to assert domination. No. Just… just _no_! Without her main weapon system in function, Ray turned to the only defense mechanism she had left: her teeth. Ray didn't have many, as the aesthetic wasn't truly needed while she was on her own, but it was with enough force that it broke through the human girl's skin. Leilani immediately pulled her arm away, letting out a yelp of pain.

"You bit me! A robot bite me!" she even cried out in surprise. But then she paused for a moment before saying, "Truthfully, I don't know how I feel about this..."

"You should be terrified." Ray spat. "Put my weapon system back online or I'll do it again."

"I'm not going to do that." Leilani insisted although she attempted to keep her voice calm. "You need to be fixed, and I'll be damned if you leave here still with that itch. You know what that itch is, don't you? It's a bug that causes you to feel pain equal to being slapped in an electric chair if you're low on xels. Your creator abandoned you because this bug is nearly impassible with all that padding on your main frame- for some reason, he didn't feel like taking apart everything to fix it, so he left you to rot!"

"How do you know that?" Ray snapped with a growl.

"It's in your coding!" Leilani shouted back before whipping around to get a printed sheet from the desk behind her. The sheet was roughly three feet in length and it was shoved directly into Ray's face- a quick note that some sections of the printed words were highlighted, to show interest.

"It's right there," Leilani pointed out, sticking a finger at a line of text somewhere near the middle of the document, "Error in XelProc; Author's note, can not access to fix."

"So I have a bug." Ray grumbled, looking at the human- who seemed to be no less annoyed at the situation. "That doesn't prove he didn't try. It doesn't prove that he abandoned me either. All this proves is that you think you're better than him when you're not even legal yet- is that it? You feel empowered because of your closeted hobby? What do you have to gain from holding me here and demanding to change the very root of who I am? I lived without you or your proposed bullshit for long enough- why should I change my way now, I was perfectly fine!"

Leilani's lips pursed together as if she intended to say something, but forced herself to not say it.

"Fine." the girl finally said. "I have a friend coming over later any way. I'll start working on placing your weapons back after he leaves, deal?"

Ray gave the girl a rather smug smile. "Deal." she agreed.

. . .

The doorbell rang seven times before Leilani was able to answer it.

"Hello Mitch." the girl greeted in a dull tone, still miffed about her talk with Raychel. Hiding behind a medium sized crate that looked a bit heavy, Mitch, her 16 year old boyfriend, was roughly a fourth Indian and a third Italian. But at the moment he was 100% concerned.

"First you request for rare parts that took a decade to find," he complained, nearly dropping said parts that he had placed in the crate, "Then you ignore my texts on why you need them? Lei, what the heck are you hiding and why is it so important?"

The girl shook her head, not wanting to talk about it, but Mitch knew better.

"What's up Leilani?" Mitch kindly inquired as he set the parts down inside the door so he could enter the house. "Did the new body end up being a dud or something? You know you can't save them all Lei, but I'm still here if you need the help."

"Let's take the parts down." Leilani told him, acting as if she were ignoring him somewhat. Raising an eyebrow at her strange behavior, Mitch complied and picked the crate back up to lug downstairs. Leilani followed close behind to make sure he didn't have a serious fall.

"Wait." she requested when the reached the door that led into the basement room. Taking the opportunity, Mitch set the crate back down and took a breather as the girl checked a panel on the wall. "She's offline." the girl sighed, "We have to be silent so she doesn't wake up."

Mitch nodded as he started to get up again, grunting when he had to pick the crate back up- this time Leilani helped him as she took a side and guided them into the self-made lab. They set the crate down safely near a standing tool chest. Leilani waited for Mitch to catch his breath before carefully taking his hand, signaling for him to be quiet, and led him to where Raychel laid. It took all it had in the teen to not yell in surprise.

"She… she's..." he stuttered, unsure of what to say.

"Now you see the problem?" Leilani questioned before she led him over her computer. "She doesn't even want help, I can't believe it. But just look at her specs Mitch- they're so intricate, so beautiful, so unique. And that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of all the data I've collected so far!"

"Am I going to have to worry about you running away with a robot?" Mitch asked her with a raise of his eyebrow. "If so, I need a good warning before you decide that you like robotic women more than men… or me."

Leilani looked at him with a rather confused glance.

"Why would I do that?" she inquired. With a shake of his head, he refused to answer her.

"You can't save everyone Lei." Mitch instead reminded her. "But for curiosity's sake, what _were_ you planing to do to her?"

"I wanted to strip away everything at the legs and arms first. But the main priority would be getting the head uncovered and possibly fixed up as well. Other than that, the torso, neck, and head are going to be the most problematic."

"Which was why you needed the parts?" Mitch asked, seeing where she was going with this. "To give her some form to sustain on while you analyzed the armor?"

Leilani nodded. "Exactly." she agreed. Mitch nodded as he understood.

"You tried Leilani." he said to her, hoping that he was being helpful. "Maybe we can look over the designs with some ice cream or something? Come on."

Thinking it over, the girl agreed to this and together they went back upstairs. What they didn't know was that Ray had heard every word and was now having second thoughts about the whole ordeal. Maybe it was time for a patch after all…


	4. By Freudian Elimination

The only sound in the lab were of the sparks flying off of Ray's body as Leilani prepared to place her weapons online again. Both of them were silent, refusing to speak for numerous reasons. But Ray had an itch, a different kind from earlier that was born from curiosity and the nagging feeling of wanting to know more about this child and her adamant thoughts on trying to fix her.

"I'm not the first robot under Cherry Dynamics to meet your... acquaintance?" Ray asked. Her tone was vague, and her expression was unreadable. It didn't stop the girl from working though.

"No, you weren't." Leilani agreed with a shake of her head. "CDN 67-8.72.18, nicknamed Troilus. He runs completely on petroleum and he's even able to produce his own. Despite the serial number, he was actually the second generation of bots to be produced under CherryDyn's patents- if you want to consider the CDN 12XX line as the first generation, of course."

"Sounds familiar..." Ray faintly mumbled.

"He's an official contender in the Battle Colosseum." the girl explained. "The most popular rivalry in general is between Troilus and Mighty Number One, Pyrogen. Some of their fights had to have special security terms due to some rather lethal issues. It gets really, really ugly from what I've heard."

Ah yes, now she could remember it. The girl was right, those battle got ugly, and it wasn't from the contenders themselves. After one of those fights, Ray almost always overheard a conversation where some sucker lost a house or something due to one side winning, or the bots coming to a draw. She snickered at the thought, earning her an odd look from Leilani. But the human quickly ignored it. Ray wasn't done talking yet though.

"If… you could," the bot started to say, drawing her thoughts out slowly and carefully, "What would it take for you to run a defragmentation on my system? It's been awhile, and as it seems, I can not begin the process on my own."

This made the human girl pause.

"It would be similar to the process of taking the bug out of your system," Leilani informed her. "Due to attempting to reach your core, which is buried under layers of overpowered armor. Without a pathway to the core, there isn't a pathway to do anything with you cognitively. Why?"

"I want a defragmentation." Ray repeated with a bit of a haughty undertone. "Is there a problem with that? Or, with all your talk, can you not do such a basic process?"

The human girl looked at Ray with a slight raise of her eyebrow. "I can do it." Leilani affirmed. "But like I said, I'm going to have to take you apart to get to your core. Are you sure you want me to do that? It could take a week, at least, maybe even a month."

Ray glared at Leilani. "I'm going to repeat myself." the bot told the girl darkly. "I want a defragmentation and you're going to do it for me, got it?"

The only answer Leilani could give was a look of near surprise. Then the girl got up and got a different set of tools from a nearby toolbox.

"It might hurt." Leilani warned. Ray gave a snide smirk in retaliation.

"You'll find that I'm very resilient to pain." came the very boastful answer.

. . .

"What parts do you intend to supply me with as you rip apart my armor?" Ray casually questioned as Leilani effectively worked on removing the bot's boots.

"SP build Omega, possibly the rarest parts of Cherry Dynamics' original robot lineup." the girl informed her with a casual roll of her shoulder. "It's even rarer than SP build Alpha- the very parts built to create CDN 1201, Trinity. Some say that one of those Mighty Numbers over at the Battle Colosseum has SP Alpha bits too. Personally, I think it's the youngest one- Number 9, which is why he isn't usually seen competing."

"Predator..." Ray realized as her pupils shrunk at the mention.

"What was that?" Leilani asked, peering a bit to see Ray's expression- she didn't have much luck though.

"Nothing." the bot immediately dismissed, training her eyes up to the ceiling. "Nothing but a thought."

"Alright then..." the girl agreed with a slow nod before getting back to work.

"Your friend that was supposed to come over," Ray then spoke up, "Was he the one that dropped off the parts?"

"Yeah." Leilani agreed. "He works at a warehouse that houses a lot of old robot equipment. He knows the place like the back of hand."

"His name was Mitch, correct?"

The human paused. "How did you…?"

"Even offline, I still have some degree of awareness." Ray quickly informed the girl, telling a mild lie at best. "He seemed older than you."

"Only by two years." Leilani sheepishly admitted. "We started dating a year ago, if only to give our relationship a name that would satisfy everyone, since, you know, we weren't siblings or anything."

"Human emotions and labels are trivial." Ray huffed. "You could have done better than that."

"Am I hearing this right?" Leilani questioned with a small laughter, "Are you jealous?"

"And for what reason do you have to think that?!" Ray immediately snapped, earning another light laugh from the human girl.

"Well, it certainly doesn't seem like nagging." came the warm reply. "And I highly doubt you meant it to be nurturing either. So, by Freud's process of elimination..."

"Are you going to remove this armor so you can commit a defragmentation or not?!" Ray roared with anger. "Quit stalling and do the thing I commanded you to do already!"

To the bot's annoyance, the girl couldn't help but let out a laugh. "What ever you say Raychel-hime." Leilani chuckled as she continued to work. Ray was not amused.

. . .

5KY51R3N: We're defragging!

NullVoid00: so help me, even tho i no what u mean, i thought of something else

NullVoid00: raychel wanted to go through a defrag?

5KY51R3N: Yes!

5KY51R3N: I told her it would take a week.

5KY51R3N: A day for each limb and then some.

5KY51R3N: I can still learn about her.

5KY51R3N: I can still sort through her coding for that bug.

5KY51R3N: Maybe…

5KY51R3N: Maybe she'll let me fix her too after.

NullVoid00: L…

5KY51R3N: I said maybe.

NullVoid00: but u can't save everyone

5KY51R3N: I can try.

NullVoid00: L

NullVoid00: i'm coming over tomorrow early

NullVoid00: is that alright?

5KY51R3N: Sure! I'll need an extra hand anyway.

NullVoid00: remember L, just a defrag

NullVoid00: not a nip n tuck

NullVoid00: alright?

5KY51R3N: Alright…

5KY51R3N: See you tomorrow then?

NullVoid00: yep. c u

NullVoid00 has signed out


	5. Lei Knows No Boundaries

Mitch first rung the doorbell of the townhouse ten minutes after nine. Leilani, who had just gotten dressed after taking a shower, was shaking the towel off of her head before greeting him.

"Thank you so much for coming." she proclaimed as she slung her arms around his neck for a tight embrace.

"Gotta make sure you don't cheat on me with a bot." Mitch replied with a teasing smile. Leilani looked at him with a confused glance.

"Why would I do that?" she questioned.

"I'm joking." he assured her as he started to guide them to the basement door. "I know you don't like turning a robot down if they need the hardware update- but unlike the last time, this bot can (and has) told you no. They have their own wants and wishes too, creepily enough, and maybe it's time you learned to respect that."

The girl frowned. "You're doubting me?"

"Not doubt per say..." Mitch admitted with an uncomfortable shrug. "But… boundaries. You're not very familiar with them. When someone says no, they mean no Lei."

Leilani let out a small huff as the two went down the staircase to the basement. She never noticed it about herself, her stubbornness to keep working on a bot until they were in perfect order again. The last time a bot came into her care that was in absolute disrepair, Leilani lost days of sleep just to make sure the robot could reactivate. It was a bot before Raychel, and in retrospect, likely in a better condition then than what Raychel was in now. Mitch could have been her older brother had it not been for his constant worries of her liking a synthetic being more than a human.

"I'll need a lot of help with this Mitch." Leilani then sighed, looking up at her boyfriend with lost eyes. "I'll need a lot of advice, and ice cream, and..."

Smiling, Mitch placed a kind hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry," he assured her kindly, "I've got your back. Always do, don't I?"

Hopeful, Leilani flung her arms around his neck again for a hug. "I love you." she graciously thanked. Mitch smiled as he hugged her back. After several moments, the two pulled away and entered the basement laboratory where Raychel was waiting rather impatiently for them.

"Took you long enough." she huffed indignantly.

"How are you feeling?" Leilani asked her quite nicely as she walked to the bot's side, leaving Mitch to set up a small area to sit near Raychel's right leg.

"I don't." was the cold reply. The girl took this as a good sign.

"Yesterday I was able to completely remove the armor on your left leg, so today we are going to start on the right."

Ray nodded in agreement. Sounded fair enough.

"Removing the armor around your right leg should be faster than removing the left's armor, so if there was enough time, I was going to start removing your helmet. That sounds alright with you?"  
"Sure." Ray dimly agreed. "Just get it over with."

The girl nodded as she went to the spot Mitch had prepared. "Did you start the soldering iron?" she asked him in passing.

"Yes ma'am." he agreed. "Would you like the safety goggles now?"

"Yes, and the gloves."

"What about the doors?"

"Open both of them up. Get the box fan from the spare room too and set it up outside the door."

Mitch gave a firm nod as he went to do so. As he did that, Leilani started to work. After that, the only sound that could be heard were of sparks flying and the low buzz of the fan. Faintly, it almost gave the same feeling of a surgery room- the blinding white walls against migraine inducing lights, the occasional talk between the 'doctor' and her 'nurse', and -worst of all- the passage of time seemed to go on forever.

Ray could count the passage of time though, better than any of the humans' could. It was around three hours, twenty minutes, and five seconds exactly when Leilani let Mitch take away the last part of the armor on the bot's upper thigh.

"Done." the human sighed blissfully. Then she got up to move her seat closer to the top of Ray's head, to a spot where the bot couldn't see her without twisting her neck at an odd angle. "I'm going to start removing your helmet now." the girl announced carefully, "You might experience a tingle, similar enough to ASMR."

"Alright." Ray agreed, keeping her eyes training to the ceiling as she had been doing for the past three hours. "Go on."

Leilani gave the sound of giving an affirming nod before starting to work again. About forty-one minutes in, Ray began to feel that sensation the young genius had spoke up. The robot closed her eyes, giving in to the feeling -as she didn't have much of a choice- and, unintentionally, let out a low, gentle sigh of faint euphoria. What the bot didn't realize at first, was that this caused the human girl to tighten her grip on the soldering iron just slightly in reaction.

But the good feeling didn't last very long, as someone's phone decided to buzz. Leilani looked up and turned to Mitch, indicating that he should answer it. Nodding, the older teenager went to their phones and picked up Leilani's, he brought it closer to her as he put it on speaker.

"You're on speaker," Leilani addressed as she slowly started to close certain wires, in fear of who was calling.

"Miss Blaise, it is time for your music lesson." the voice of an older man resonated from the phone's speaker.

"Shiz." the girl cursed under her breath, just loud enough for Ray to barely hear. "I forgot about that." Then she said, loud enough to be heard, "Can't we reschedule?"

"I'm already outside your door madam. I've rung the doorbell more than enough times already."

The girl groaned. "But I feel sick!" she then proclaimed, even mustering an extremely forced cough. Mitch snickered at her. Ray thought she was going to hurt herself if she kept up the act.

"Nice try Miss Blaise," the voice on the other end laughed, "But you and I both know that a sudden case of the forced coughs will not stop your lesson. Consider it your metronome for the day."

"Fine!" Leilani then vigorously declared, "I was making out with Richard and our clothes are tossed all over the floor and I don't feel like getting up!"

This caused several moments of extremely awkward silence- if she had the power to, Ray likely would have slapped her forehead in disbelief. Mitch, on the other hand, looked as if he had broken his jaw due to dropping it so low. Ray was confused for a moment before coming to the assumption that Richard must have been Mitch's real name, with the latter serving as a well used nickname.

"Miss Blaise," the voice on the phone then spoke up, almost sounding as if it were mildly impressed but heavily perturbed, "We also both know that you've respected your father's wishes of remaining virtuous until you've reached 16 years of age. And, as you recall, Mister Richardson also agreed to this testament. So, would you kindly come allow me inside this house for our lesson today?"

Silently, Ray had taken a moment to snicker herself. Richard Richardson? No wonder the guy wanted to be called by a different name.

"Give me ten more minutes." Leilani then requested as she set her mind back to closing off any open wires in Ray's head.

"Five."

After a pause, the girl let out a small, "Fine."

"And do hurry," the voice then finished, "This October air is really chilly!" and with that, the line ended.

"You're a really bad liar." Ray entertained as the girl quickly secured multiple connections for a temporary fix.

"Bite me." the girl challenged, in no fit mood to carry a nice conversation.

"I did." the bot smirked, "And I _still_ have a highly disgusting, metallic undertaste in my mouth."

Mitch stared at them. "What… the _hell_ … did I miss?" he questioned with widening eyes.

"Arguing." the both of them answered without a second thought.

"Come on Mitch," the girl then said as she took her boyfriend by the arm, "At least he knows you're here too."

Confused, all Mitch could do was nod as the duo started to head out. His hand lingered over the breaker that controlled the power before Ray spoke up,

"Leave the lights on." she requested. The teenaged boy raised an eyebrow before giving a small shrug of agreement.

"See you in an hour." he told her before shutting the door behind him. Ray didn't answer, instead she looked up at the ceiling and waited.


	6. An Army, You Say?

Leilani loved her music teacher, Andrew with all her heart, honest, but today she had decided that he was not her friend. Raychel just seemed more important than making sure she could do scales on the piano, or proper breath control with her flute, or not purposely imposing screeching violins from a horror movie. The set of music that they were working on was one of Leilani's favorite scores, but today she just couldn't put her heart into it. She needed to get back to Raychel. She needed to set a proper connection in her wires before something short circuited. She needed to create a more powerful external power source for Raychel too, other than the energen fragments, which were starting to subtly be rejected by her system. She really needed to...

"Listen to the music Miss Blaise." Andrew said to her, keeping time with his zills. He loved those things, he loved them the same way Leilani never gave up on her current projects. Story went that he got them from an Egyptian belly dancer years ago (he used to perform music back then instead of teaching it), and that night he and that dancer brought the house down- the best performance he ever pulled off in his career. Maybe even the only performance in his career, if the other stories held true.

"You've been rather absent this session, Miss Blaise." Andrew said to her as they were getting ready to wrap up. "It's been awhile. Were you really that distracted by wanting to be more intimate with Mister Richardson, or are you hiding something again?"

Although distracted in her own thoughts, Leilani let out an uncomfortable chuckle. "You know I like my projects Andrew." she admitted, shying away from him in hopes he'd get the hint to leave. He did get the hint, but he actively ignored it.

"Miss Blaise," Andrew then said, giving a sullen sigh, "You're going to get yourself in trouble one of these days. You're the only person I know that adamantly refuses to wait to come of age before working with advanced technology. Then again, I don't know much others who openly show your apparent level of skill..."

"It's not that open..." Leilani mumbled with a shake of her head.

"You have small army Miss Blaise." Andrew informed her, quite seriously.

"Six robots is not a small army."

"Six robots, three of them with creators fully aware of your meddling, me, Mister Richardson, your father, your neighbor Della, whomever Mister Richardson interacts with to obtain the parts you need, whomever you interact with to obtain the information you need; Madam, that _is_ a small army."

"Then why don't you guys turn me in?" the girl questioned. Her voice was tiny though, she knew the answer, and some times she couldn't believe it. Andrew gave another sigh as he placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Because we don't want to see you get hurt- especially over the thing you love doing the most." Andrew said to her. "I'll be back next week at the same time. Don't leave me waiting outside the door again, understood?"

"Yes sir." the girl quietly agreed. With a pat on the shoulder, Andrew gave her a small, worn smile before he left for the day. Leilani started to make her way back the basement to check on Raychel and make more adjustments, but was stopped by Mitch as she touched the doorknob.

"Come have some dinner," he offered, "I was working on it while you were at your lesson."

The girl shook her head. "I have to-" she started to say, but was cut off when Mitch insisted,

"Eat dinner, then you can help her."

Leilani looked up at Mitch with pleading eyes. She really didn't want to, it was only four-ish in the afternoon anyway so technically it was an early dinner.

"She's waited this long," Mitch argued, "She can wait another fifteen minutes for you to eat."

First Andrew warns her about having an army should she need it, and now Mitch technically telling her to ignore the most broken bot in America? Their hearts were in the right place, she gave them that, but that didn't mean she easily understood their concern.

"Can I take it to go?" the girl requested. "I'm not that hungry."

To say that worry was the only expression Mitch gave her, would have been an understatement. However, he couldn't just bring himself to say no to her easily. They might have been considered an official couple a year ago, but they had been friends much longer than that. They knew how to get under each other's skin, how to egg the other on into doing their bidding, and they could recognize when the other needed a break despite protests otherwise…

"Sure." the teenager agreed with a sullen shake of his head. "Just try to come back up before midnight- or I'll come drag you up myself."

"You're going to spend the night?"

"Are you giving me much of a choice?"

For a moment, Leilani remained where she was before flinging her arms around her boyfriend in a tight embrace. "I love you." she graciously muttered in his ear. "I don't deserve you either."

Mitch gave Leilani a rather sad look as he slowly started to return the hug. "Someone's gotta take care of you," he sighed with a small smile, "Even when you think you don't need it."

Beaming bright, Leilani squeezed Mitch even tighter, completely oblivious to his concern.

. . .

As much as she didn't care for humans, Ray was aware that they eat to gain energy to burn- to function even. From the time Leilani had brought the food down with her, and when she started to babble about creating some new energy based on the data she'd collected so far, the human girl had only taken three bites out of whatever food she brought down with her. The rest went cold and likely uneatable after that.

The girl kept going on about xels, and power, and those energen fragments that apparently weren't working as well as they used to.

"Your body seems to know that the energen fragments are fake, so it's begun to reject it." Leilani explained as she fervently typed something on her computer. "However, with the processing error of the xels in your body, normal xels just aren't going to cut it. I think I can create my own variation of legitimate xels, but they need to have a greater lifespan (so to speak) to keep you properly maintained. They'd need to be, like, the Superman of xels!"

"Are you going to finish your dinner?" Ray eventually questioned out loud.

"You care?" Leilani quipped without looking at the bot.

"Barely." Ray snorted. "But I know humans _die_ when malnourished."

"I'm not malnourished." the girl rebutted kindly. "I've eaten pretty well today."

"Three bites of whatever that meal is does not count as eating 'pretty well'." Ray tonelessly spat. This caused Leilani to pause and turn around to face the bot. The girl even tilted her head as if she were confused. Ray rolled her eyes and explained; "You started working on me around nine-twenty this morning and worked until your teacher came around at three-thirty. I doubt you took lunch after, as it was clearly five o'clock exactly when you came back down with that plate. You _are_ malnourished, considering how far you've worked in that time frame."

Leilani looked at Ray, as if deciding something. "They say, that we'll know when robots have evolved to the state of being most human when they are capable of thinking like us." she then said, slowly and carefully. "But I don't think that's true. I think there would be some other sign, a higher form of thinking that even some humans can't quite pull off all the time."

"And what's that?" Ray questioned without a thought. Leilani paused for a moment as she lulled over her words, before saying,

"The ability to lie to yourself, and believing it."


	7. Pretty Girl

Days passed by, and with each day a new part of Ray's armor would come off. Admittedly, Ray started to feel lighter- and not just in kilograms. Leilani had explained, in mild passing, that it was due to her power cells beginning to focus on only one source- enough to keep Ray functioning and nothing else. The human girl also continued to develop the 'Superman of xels' for the bot as she learned more information from the armor. Mitch was able to find some xels in his magical warehouse of everything, so when a day of dissecting Ray ended early, Leilani would focus on the xels instead.

Speaking of xels, Ray hardly ever thought about having any nowadays- unless some was presented to her, then she would wolf it down as if it were the first time experiencing such a thing. It could have been due, in some small part, to Leilani regularly ensuring that Ray was being input with xels directly while working on her- similar to intravenous therapy. But it was the last thing that the bot regularly thought of while all the dissembling took place.

Ray was starting to contemplate how her relationship with the human had progressed -while at the same time calculating whether or not robots could get Stockholm Syndrome. There wasn't a lot of talk between them when the human started to concentrate, but when they did, it was mostly light conversations to ease the white noise. Small talk like the weather, or some info about the past bots Leilani helped. For example, if Leilani ever screamed bloody murder, one of the bots named Tribus would come immediately. Or, did you know that Troilus regularly sang praises of Leilani in front of Pyrogen while still keeping her main identity secret? How about Horus, the first bot that Leilani ever helped? His body was like a giant lightbulb and was currently acting as a tourist guide in some cavern or another in Virginia.

This _had_ to be Stockholm at this point, there was no other way to explain it.

"Your helmet is coming off completely today." Leilani informed Ray one morning with a light smile. "Once it's gone, I'll be able to hook you up to my computer to finally begin the defrag."

"About time." Ray huffed. Leilani gave a small chuckle before turning her attention to Mitch.

"Is everything ready?" she asked him.

"Yes ma'am." he agreed with a grin. "Let's see if your favorite impatient patient has hair."

"Don't get too attached to the idea." Ray grumbled.

"Let's start." Leilani kindly suggested, to which the other two agreed. The girl then set to work, removing what was left of Ray's helmet. Ray closed her eyes about ten minutes in- this process was like having your head massaged by the hair dresser and experiencing ASMR at the same time. It was the perfect way to kill someone while they experienced nothing but total bliss. It didn't take the young genius long to finish off the helmet and hand the remains to Mitch for safekeeping.

"Can you sit up for me?" Leilani requested. "The inputs are located at the nape of your neck."

Slow and mechanical, Ray did so to allow the girl access. Working as quickly as a little spider, Leilani got a few cables that were connected to her computer and dexterously placed them in Ray's input hubs without even touching the bot. Then the girl went back to her computer to quickly enter multiple codes.

"Done!" she declared as she sent off the last line of coding to Ray. "The estimations place a rough 24 hours for the process to complete, but you can do whatever you want."

Ray scoffed. "And what am I supposed to do, besides sit here like I have been?" she questioned with a rather unkind glare.

"Well..." Leilani then said as her face started to flush a light pink, "I was thinking I could show you my house. Maybe even find some clothes for you that fit your new frame. Or… or I could still fix you, physically, I mean."

"Lei..." Mitch softly groaned. "This wasn't a-"

"Nip and tuck. I know." the girl agreed. "But..." (and she turned to look directly at Ray) "You could look even more pretty without all that armor on."

The look of confusion the girl got was equal from the other two.

"Is that my warning?" Mitch questioned to Leilani. Leilani looked back at him with a slight raise of her eyebrow.

"Do you want it to be?" she asked him, sounding a bit curious.

"No..." he admitted with a sheepish shake of his head.

"Then it isn't." Leilani told him with a small raise and lower of her shoulder. "I just… if you were going to be murdered in the dark from an unknown assailant, would you rather it be by a succubus or a zombie?"

"Succubi is the painless option, right?" Mitch playfully smirked. "Give me that instead of seeing my own flesh get ripped out by a brainwashed friend."

"Mitch..." Leilani groaned, a bit playfully, as she shook her head in disbelief. But Ray wasn't listening, not completely any way, as she thought the idea over.

Once, way too long ago, her creator once called her something greater than pretty; beautiful. He had called her beautiful. But the rest of her… was not. When he rejected her, she became a zombie- mindless, always killing, and... ugly… Ray had never any thought to actually consider what some other person looked like, whether or not they could be deemed 'pretty'. The very idea sent thoughts into Ray's head, just as the defragmentation reorganized said thoughts. She looked to Leilani, judging- was she pretty? Did others find her pretty? Did Ray, personally, think that Leilani was pretty?

Stockholm or not, the girl had proved to be nothing more than overeager to help. She had an idea, and she was going to stick to it. Human emotions and labels were trivial, but wouldn't this trait be deemed as 'pretty' to some?

"Fix me." Ray found herself saying out loud, gaining the surprised attention of the humans. After a look from them, she continued, "Physically. I want you to fix me physically. Can you do that?"

Leilani looked at her, honestly surprised at the turnaround but also excited. "Y-yeah!" she sputtered in awe before turning to Mitch. "Mitch, can you find me a xel graft Type V at the warehouse?"

"I can find anything." he affirmed. "Do you want it split, full, or composite?"

"Definitely full." she informed him firmly. "Also locate some extra iris sockets coded #0FB7FF, and kanekalon hair coded #60A61B. About two yards should do, leaving plenty of extra in case I botch sewing the wig."

Mitch nodded. "Got it." he affirmed. "Be back in a few hours." and with that he was gone in a flash. With him gone, Leilani then turned to Ray brightly.

"Would you like a tour of my house Raychel?" she then offered. "He's going to be awhile."

Ray thought about the idea, remembering her old plans of looking for escape routes, found herself reassessing the idea with renewed interest.

"Sure." she agreed in a slow, dull tone. "Show me how an underage robotist lives under the law's radar."

Leilani gave Ray a bright, excited smile.


	8. A Lot Like You

"Do you need help getting up?" the girl offered as Ray attempted to set her feet on the ground. "It's been over five days since you've had to stand, and a lot of your initial weight has been removed since then."

"No." Ray immediately rebutted. "I can..." her thought was cut off as she ended up stumbling over the side of the cot. Leilani reacted quickly enough and caught the bot to help her stand up straight. It was at that moment that Ray realized that Leilani was smaller than her, tall enough to just barely be able to place her chin on the bot's shoulder. The girl, otherwise, looked up at Ray with a slight expression of fear, as seeing the last time she touched the bot she ended up bitten.

"Thanks." the bot quietly muttered as she straightened herself up. She did not detach from the girl either, using her as a crutch as she got adjusted to walking again. Careful, and a bit on edge, Leilani started to guide the both of them to the door that led up to the main house. Except the door in the actual basement revealed a staircase, so together, they worked up the steps until coming to another door- this one actually did lead into the main house.

Ray had to momentarily shield her eyes from the light coming in from the windows: apparently, it was midday.

"The foyer's not that impressive." Leilani sheepishly explained to Ray. "But the kitchen is just up ahead, and if we go around that corner then we'd be in a spare bedroom."

Ray indicated that she didn't want to be near the girl anymore, and she complied, creating some distance between the two of them. Ray noticed another staircase that led up.

"Where does that go?" she asked, pointing to it.

"Upstairs." was the first reply.

"Obviously." came the cynical retort. The girl blushed a bit at it.

"My room is up there, along with another spare room." Leilani then explained. "The music room is also up there, that's where I do my music lessons."

Ray turned to look at Leilani with a raise of her eyebrow. "Where do your parents sleep?" she asked, before realizing that she had never bothered to question the idea until now.

"My dad works a lot, kinda happens when you run your own company." Leilani admitted with a small shrug, "Momma was a casualty during the Trinity epidemic… She was… crushed… by an industrial bot."

After a pause, a small "Oh." was all Ray could allow herself to say. Not that it changed her opinion on the girl, but it could partially explain why Leilani hadn't openly talked about her parents before. Even then, how could she trust robots after an incident that cost her mother's life…?

Meanwhile, Leilani was giving Ray rather curious glances. Had she said something wrong? Was the robot just so glad to get out of the basement that it was overflowing with whatever emotion it could feel? (It wouldn't have been the first time, honestly, so she was partially anticipating such.)

"Do you want to see my room?" the girl suggested. "You're probably going to be disappointed with it 'cuz there's not much there, but you did say you wanted to know how I lived with myself."

Pulled out of her train of thought, Ray looked back at Leilani with a small glare.

"I'm following you." she reminded the girl tonelessly. Leilani nodded as she motioned for Ray to follow her before starting to head up the staircase. The girl led the bot to the first door on the left and opened it up.

Well, Leilani had predicted correctly, Ray _was_ disappointed at the room. The pitiful room contained a twin-sized bed, a dresser, and a desk. The desk looked rather messy -stuffed with notes and little models of robot anatomy, xels, and positronic brains- but everything else looked clean. Too clean. In fact, the whole house seemed to be too clean for someone that currently lived in it. It was almost as if…

"You don't normally live here, do you?" Ray questioned, staring at the girl as she took a seat on the bed.

"It's our second home." Leilani admitted. "I like coming here because of, well, the underground lab. You should see my other room- it has this _huge_ walk-in closet filled with nothing but plush toys from floor to ceiling. When I was younger, I'd kick all the toys off the shelf into this big pile, and I'd jump into it. I usually ended up hurting myself..."

A small sound of bitter agreement was emitted from Ray as she started to get a bit nosier. Upon closer inspection, she found a picture frame sitting on the dresser. Leilani forced herself not to move as Ray picked up the frame to look at it better. The photograph inside was shot in black and white and detailed a rather handsome couple kissing each other, the male held a finger under the woman's chin while her arms were wrapped around his waist tightly. They seemed to be enjoying the moment, which made Ray wonder if they had known they were being photographed- staged photographs hardly ever look that genuine in emotion.

"She looks like you." Ray decided while absentmindedly tracing the outline of the woman's face. "This was your mother, wasn't it?"

Leilani gave a careful nod.

"She is… pretty." the robot then decided in a still tone, her face expressionless.

"Dad says that when she was younger, she'd act like Sherlock Holmes." Leilani informed Ray. "Like, the refusing to eat or sleep when they were working on something big part. He would get real worried about her."

"That sounds an awful lot like you." Ray once again decided, looking up at the girl with a single eyebrow raised.

"Yeah..." Leilani agreed as she started to shrink into a little ball, "I guess we kinda were the same..."

. . .

Leilani was too close to Ray's face for comfort. A necessary evil, unfortunately, as the human girl was trying to clean Ray's one eye and replacing the covering for the other. The bot used the time to admire how crisp her optics were. She could easily see each wrinkle in the girl's skin, she noticed the formulation of what was sure to be a pimple or two, and could further evaluate if she found her 'pretty' or not.

Leilani was going to look a lot like her mother, the evidence was everywhere.

When Leilani told Ray that she was going to shut down her one eye to further adjust it from the sphenoid joint directly, the bot almost found herself about to protest. It became increasingly difficult to look at the girl after that- it was even worse when Leilani insisted that Ray looked forward so the iris would be center once it was readjusted.

Bull. It was all completely bull and it sucked worse than rock candy.

But she waited, Ray waited for long enough that she felt she deserved a metal for being so good. Suffice to say that when her sight was returned, the bot nearly jumped out of her skin seeing Leilani so close to her again. For the first time, her initial reaction wasn't to harm the girl. Leilani was smiling at her brightly, a smile that -although kind- nearly made Ray terrified.

"I've finished working on your face." she told Ray with a grin. "Tomorrow we'll work on sewing your new wig in."

Ray nodded, too dumbstruck from her sudden return of vision to comment.

"Hey, it's dinner time." Mitch spoke up. "Let's all head to the kitchen and I'll made us some quick yakisoba."

"Sounds great!" Leilani agreed as she got up. She looked over at Ray who had taken the habit to just stare at the girl. "Are you coming too Raychel?"

For a moment, the robot didn't answer, earning her an odd look from Leilani and Mitch alike.

"Y-yes..." Ray finally agreed. "I'll come too."


	9. Another Ship to Wreck

The yakisoba actually looked pretty good, and maybe if Ray knew if she could actually eat it or not, she likely would have tried it too. But no, she knew her limitations, so Ray slowly absorbed the xels one by one to pad the time out.

"Supra-Xels." Mitch randomly declared at one point. "That's what you should call them Lei."

Leilani looked up at him for a moment before calmly returning to her noodles. "Isn't that the name of something in an RPG somewhere?"

"An RPG spinoff based on a side-scrolling shooter." Mitch affirmed in a matter-of-fact tone. "But that's totally what you're doing now, isn't it? You're smooshing all those xels together to create some super-powerful xel, just like what they did in that game."

Both Leilani and Ray raised an eyebrow at Mitch. "Smooshing?" they both repeated with their own level of amusement.

"Smooshing." Mitch agreed with a wide, cheeky grin. "Any way, it's sort of what you've been calling them this entire time; the Superman of xels, or whatever. You'd just removing two syllables... and a copyright claim!"

"Because a copyright claim is the only thing I have to worry about." Leilani muttered with a shake of her head. She had meant it as a joke, but Ray wondered if it was something else: Freud was a celebrated nutcase for a reason.

. . .

Ray watched Leilani with unblinking eyes as the child plaited her hair into two equal parts.

"Your hair won't be this long." the girl had told Ray at point. "A nice boy-cut with Disney bangs, the ends of which will fall a bit lower- around shoulder length."

But Ray didn't care about what hairstyle the child wanted to give her- Leilani could have said she was giving Ray a ten foot afro and she would have accepted it. The bot was caught in more troubling matters than that- the idea of leaving after this was all over, for example. Or, the mere implication that she was starting to trust and like the girl. Was Ray experiencing these changes due to her armor being removed and not having to focus on her next xel intake? It seemed logical enough, but as much as it didn't seem very satisfying, it was the only answer she could come up with.

"Where were you during the Trinity Disaster?" Ray eventually asked, almost looking as if she hadn't intended to say it out loud.

"I..." the girl started to say, hiding under her covers in a quick attempt to look like she was trying to sleep, "I already told you."

"No you haven't." Ray rebutted. "You mentioned your mother."

"Same thing." Leilani muttered. "Good night Raychel."

And at that, the whole house went silent as the humans rested. Ray, with nothing else left to do, reclined next to the child and stared up at the ceiling.

. . .

The next morning, Ray refused to go back to the basement. She was out now, and there was no way she was going to go back down in the dark for however long it took to connect a wig to her scalp. Instead, a compromise was reached; they would work on the wig in the foyer, so there was easy access to the basement should either Leilani or Mitch need to get something. The lighting was much better in the foyer as well, so it helped with the tiny seams Leilani had to create for the wig.

Ray kept extensive track of the light slowly creeping across the floor, using it as her own personal sundial into how long Leilani was taking. It was some time, as the light made its way across the floor ninety degrees from where it started. When the girl was done, she nodded for Mitch to come over so he could style Ray's hair. As he came over, she scooted out of his way and in front of Ray with a bright smile.

"Almost done." the girl promised. Ray didn't answer.

Eventually, Mitch told them both, "Lei, you need to move, I need to get around to do Raychel's bangs."

"Alright." the girl agreed, starting to stand up -almost leaving Ray with a faint want to whine- and went toward the staircase leading upstairs. "Let me know when you're done then."

"Will do." Mitch promised as he moved around to do Ray's bangs. Mitch met Ray's eye for only a fraction of a second before looking away again. "Sup?" he offered.

"You're taking too long." the robot informed him in a dark tone.

"Needed a way to stop you from ogling my girlfriend for five minutes." Mitch rebutted with a shrug. "We need to talk."

If Ray had the ability to raise her eyebrow without messing up Mitch's cutting, she would have.

"Look," Mitch then went on, "Leilani is planning on fixing your armor before she puts it back on you. Not just aesthetically either, she's trying to maximize xel absorption so it isn't as taxing on your power grid. Since you won't let her fix you directly..."

"What does this have to do with anything?" Ray questioned irritably.

"Leilani is a stubborn brat that always gets what she wants," was the immediate reply, "And at the moment, that's _you_. The problem, however, is that I can't tell whether it's a temporary urge or… something else."

"What are you implying?"

Mitch paused, even putting his styling tools down, to look Ray directly in the eye without an ounce of fear.

"If this evolves into something else," the teenager then told the robot in a dark and chilling tone, "If you cause anything that hurts Lei in any way- I will find you, and I _will_ assimilate you xel by xel. I know Leilani better than her own father; I can tell when she's attracted to something."

"Attracted?"

Mitch glared at her before returning to work once more.

"What do you mean, 'attracted'?" Ray demanded. At first, the teen's only reaction was a small shrug.

"You should have a definition in your verbal dictionary somewhere, figure it out on your own."

The robot huffed, dissatisfied with his answer but had a faint understanding of where he was going with the conversation. In silence, he finished up her bangs and made some adjustments to the back of her head before he shouted out, "Leilani, we're done!"

"Coming!" the girl shouted before coming down the steps. Ray was quick to notice that Leilani was holding a small mirror.

"Not too shabby, eh?" Mitch greeted her as the girl first laid eyes on Ray's completed hairdo.

"Mitch it's great!" Leilani agreed. The girl beamed at Ray before fumbling around with the mirror.

"Here Raychel," she then offered, holding the mirror for Ray could see herself in the reflection, "Have a look!"

Although the reflection was small in the compact mirror, Ray could see enough that she immediately froze. How long had it been, really, since she had taken a good look at her outward appearance?

This… thing that stared back at her, it wasn't the Ray that she knew. Hell, this wasn't Ray, the Vermilion Destroyer, that everyone feared either. This was… this was Raychel, not Ray. Ray was broken, barely surviving on whatever xels she could find. But Raychel… Raychel wasn't that reliant, she was beautiful- almost as beautiful as she was dangerous. But most importantly, Raychel was… Raychel was considered Leilani's friend.

"Are you alright?" the girl asked, noticing that the robot wasn't giving much of a response, immediately taking the mirror away.

"Yes..." Ray, no, Raychel replied slowly before looking at Leilani. "I've never felt better."

The girl looked at Raychel with a rather confused tilt of her head, but the robot's mind was made up.

-Attractive (adjective) : have a pleasing appearance, _especially_ : having a pleasing appearance that causes romantic feelings in someone-

Well then, if the child found the robot attractive, who was she to steer her wrong?


	10. Deja Vu?

Raychel had no need for sleep, so she wandered every corner of the townhouse that night for something to do. Leilani slept in the master bedroom upstairs, that much Raychel knew. Mitch, however, apparently slept in a guest room downstairs. It didn't stop the robot from invading either room in boredom, the humans were so far gone in their subconscious that they weren't even aware that she was there.

Around midnight, Raychel had found Leilani's research notes. Not that the robot believed that they would be top secret or anything, but anyone could have stolen them and claim them as their own. Even if the human genius found out about it, she likely would have lost the case due to her being underage and without a robotic license. With this thought, Raychel let out a soft snicker as she read over Leilani's notes.

The feat was easier said than done, as Leilani wrote in near unintelligible shorthand. Mitch boasted that he could read it, not that Raychel cared. After studying the human for long enough, even Raychel could understand the text. It went a little something like this;

 _Reversal stage part nine complete, absolute xel absorption method about 69% decided_

 _Able to replace near all right face – hella blue eyes are hard to replicate and clean – can't decide on ivory teeth or silver plated, I'll call Ms Iris at FF &D about sizes_

 _Supra-Xels demand tons of their original counterparts, like little leeches pumping out 10,000+ W than usual – hope I don't end up throwing them, they seem rather unstable… Hell with it, one toss out the window, I have a good arm. What could happen? - I… I think I broke something. Oops… I'll check it out in the morning._

(There were a lot of doodles in this next part, apparently she had gotten stuck… or just felt like doodling. Most of them resembled clothes or small, feminine body details. Then came the introspective;)

 _She didn't even ask._

 _I never gave her the choice._

 _I knew she belonged to CherryDyn, but I couldn't just report her, to turn her in… She was broken. What if they intentionally threw her out? No… not what if, they did. They DID intentionally throw her out WITH full knowledge that she had a functioning cognitive circuit._

 _I didn't give her the choice._

 _If I hadn't removed her weapons first, I don't think I would have been alive right now. Not only do I think that she'd be able to get away with the murder, I think that she would be able to lie to herself about the blood on her hands. Having higher intelligence doesn't mean the ability to lie to others, but being able to lie to yourself and believing it as truth._

 _I wouldn't have given her the choice._

 _Because everyone deserves to live, even if they were forgotten, rejected, or broken. I've spent years on my life to help robots that seemed to have needed it, and she was no exception. Let this be something that goes in the books once I'm in jail because of this: I. Regret. Nothing._

Raychel raised an eyebrow at this as she carefully tucked the journal away. A nearby clock blared the numbers 3:45 AM in blood red letters- the humans were going to start the process of waking up soon. Knowing that Leilani would likely react negatively at her snooping, Raychel made her way downstairs and into the kitchen. That was where Raychel took notice of a large, rectangular tin on the counter. Admittedly, she knew it had been there before, but she didn't notice that it had something stuck to the top of it. With nothing else to do, Raychel got closer to the tin and looked at the top.

The tin, it seemed, had a yellow sticky note on it, and as Raychel peered closer she realized that it was her name scrawled on it. Scrawled, in Leilani's handwriting. Raising an eyebrow of interest, Raychel carefully removed the tin lid to reveal the container filled to the top with xels. No… they weren't normal xels… Supra-Xels, that's what they were, that's what Mitch decided to call them.

Taking one of the Supra-Xels, Raychel absorbed it and calmly found that it had a slight mint undertaste to it. Wait… that didn't seem right. It didn't seem possible. Sure, the girl was smart, but was she really so smart that she added _flavor_ to the xels? Curious, and far more hungry than what she had thought, Raychel took each xel one by one, split them in half for comparisons (and demanding interrogations) later, and started to indulge in this odd new creation.

She eventually managed to go through nearly half the tin of Supra-Xels by the time Leilani made her way downstairs. Raychel didn't even register the human's presence until the little thing spoke up,

"So you like them, then?"

If the robot still had her weapons on her, Leilani would have been vaporized on the spot. But the initial desire to blast the girl into another dimension quickly deterred into the matter at hand.

"What are these?" Raychel questioned, holding the half portion of Supra-Xel in front of Leilani. The human blinked at it before carefully taking it away from the robot.

"A Supra-Xel, remember?" she calmly denoted, "Mitch dubbed 'em that. It took, like, a ton of normal xels to make and..."

"No not that." Raychel growled. "The flavor. How did you give each xel their own flavor? It's impossible! I don't even _have_ taste receptors and yet I _know_ it has flavor."

Leilani shrugged. "It wasn't that hard- just like adding artificial flavoring to licorice."

"It can't be that easy." Raychel distrustfully sneered.

"Not if you don't try." Leilani shrugged again. The robot's glare did not fade.

"How are my favorite girls doing this morning?!" Mitch cheerfully greeted from behind them, tickling Leilani at her ribs- scaring the human girl enough to scream. Appropriately, he was slapped away.

"Breakfast isn't ready yet." Leilani told him with a sour face. "It was your turn, remember?"

"Vaguely." the teenaged boy lulled with a roll of his shoulder. "Pancakes, eggs over easy, and hash browns, yeah?"

"Yes please." Leilani agreed. Mitch clicked his tongue at her and went right on it. Watching him with a shake of her head, Leilani then laid her head down on the counter.

"You can't still be tired." Raychel told the human girl tonelessly. "You slept for exactly eight hours, and demonstrated a stable transition into REM."

Leilani rolled her head over to look at the robot. "You watched me sleep?" she mused, unsure of whether to find it interesting or horrifying.

"Partially." the robot admitted without shame or thought. "I don't have a need to sleep, but I am under house arrest to keep you out of jail, as it were. As if I really want to watch you mumble mathematical formulas in your sleep."

Although Raychel had been serious, Leilani gave a small smile as she started to sit up again.

"Today we're going to try to reassemble your armor again." she decided to tell the robot. "With the Supra-Xels, you should have no problems losing power so often too. You'll feel like a new robot almost."

"Almost?" Raychel attested with a grimace. "All you've ever done since you've held me hostage is change everything about me- that's illegal."

Leilani let out a laughter and a grin. "Slight physical alternations and running defragmentation are not illegal." she boasted. "I know, I've checked. Besides, you wouldn't bite the hand that feeds you, would you?"

Raychel did not answer, instead recoiling a bit in thought and went silent. If she had the potential to lie to herself, did she also have the potential to bite the hand that feeds?

Leilani tilted her head at this behavior. She had noticed a change in the robot's behavior since they had started, but she hadn't said anything about it. It was... odd for her to say the least. Of course, she didn't even noticed the changes in her own behavior...

"You wanna know what I think?" Mitch then spoke up as he laid a plate of food in front of Leilani.

"What?" both females questioned at the same time.

"I think we need a break." he finished. "Let's go out on the town or something- maybe see if anyone good's fighting at the Colosseum. It's practically been a week since you've left the house Lei, it's time to get some fresh air."

"What did you have in mind?" Leilani asked as she started to eat her breakfast.

Her answer was greeted with a wide, playful smile.


End file.
